Think of something you value that:
A. multiple other people you know are capable of achieving, but that
B. you assume you would not be capable of achieving, even though
C. you have never actually tried to do this thing well before.
Now suppose, for a moment, that you have no choice but to do the thing. That is, everything you care about in the world will be destroyed if you do not achieve it in X months. Here, X could be 1 if it’s a very small thing, or X could be 100 if it’s a much larger thing.
Under those circumstances, do you STILL believe you would fail to achieve it?
I think this sort of thought experiment can help us distinguish between things that we don’t believe we are capable of merely because we aren’t motivated enough versus things that we ACTUALLY believe are impossible for us.
And I think it’s important to distinguish between these two cases, because if something is in the first category, we may actually be able to get ourselves to succeed just by finding ways to increase our motivation!
I also suspect that for many people, a number of the things that they view as being impossible for them would be more likely to seem possible in the face of carrying out this thought experiment. In other words, it is easy to confuse “I’m not motivated enough to try really hard” with “I’m incapable.”
As an example: suppose that you believe you are just inherently bad at math and that no matter how hard you try, you couldn’t understand calculus. Well, what if the fate of the world rested on you understanding calculus in six months? Under those circumstances, I think you would very likely find a way to learn it, with plenty of time to spare.
This piece was first written on April 26, 2018, and was first released on this site on October 1, 2021.
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